More on the subject of truth

After I wrote the last six people twelve times post, I immediately wanted to delete it.

It was incredibly hard for me to write, and also incredibly hard for me to allow others to read how I feel. How I truly, deeply feel about a subject. Especially about a subject as emotionally charged as parenthood. I am scared that when I truly share how I feel, no one will understand, and I will be alone.

I am not, nor have I ever been, a very private person. I am an open book. In person, I have no problem sharing personal anecdotes even with a stranger. I don’t take myself very seriously. I rarely get embarrassed. I have nothing to hide. I operate below the surface, meaning I don’t want to bother with small talk. I want to dig in and talk about THINGS. Too Much Information? Never. Not with me. I want to really know the people that come into my life. I want to be a safe place for them, so that they allow me in. And I am a lot of the time, and they do a lot of the time. I think it is what allows me to take the photographs I take.

A lot of people just feel safe with me.

The problem is, I don’t often give myself the same safety net of myself. I have operated most of my life perpetually worried about how I come across. How others see me. I have obsessed for hours after a party about the things I have said or not said. I have chosen not to walk on a busy street alone, for fear of the eyes on me as I cross a busy intersection, and what they may sum up about me from a split second. I have chosen not to stand up for myself or my children, at times, to different authorities (medical, educational, etc), because I want to believe in them, I want to belong, and because I doubt myself. I have put others over myself and my own opinions and thoughts more times than I can count. I have held back on my opinions on politics, religion, child rearing, family, alternative medicine, organic food, vaccinations, the list goes on. Personal anecdotes are one thing – personal opinions and feelings are something entirely different.

I have always tragically walked the line of being extremely confident in who I am, to doubting every single little thing I have ever thought. I remember going into ninth grade, and after having to wear glasses since the third grade, finally being old enough to try contacts. Back then, kids in glasses were teased or bullied. I was teased and bullied. Mercilessly, almost every day of my school education up to that point. Not just about the glasses, but they certainly didn’t help my situation. When my Mom offered the contact route, I remember saying, “No, I don’t need contacts. I like how I look in glasses. If anyone thinks I look like a dork, I don’t care.” Well, I desperately didn’t want to care, but of course I did. The only way I could gain some control was by saying “I’m choosing to wear these stupid glasses dammit! So screw you if you don’t like it!” The only way I could make myself feel better was to fake that confidence. I fully bought into the adage: Fake It Until You Make It. I just thought someday I would make it!

The tag line I chose for my business, “Just Be You”, is so much more than a tag line. It came to me in the middle of the night, many many years ago. It is a flashlight through the dark into the deepest part of my soul – it is me telling me, “It is okay Tara – just to be. Just be whoever you are. The important people won’t care about the messy bits, the ugly bits, the opinions that differ from theirs – they will love you anyway.” It is my mantra, my meditation, my mission statement. But often, it eludes me.

Here on my blog, I talk specifically about a lot in my life. Like I said, I am an open book. A lot of beautiful personal anecdotes are written here. A lot of talking about the other five people who live in my house. But not a lot of talking about me. About my personal opinions. My personal feelings. Also, here on my blog, I have always limited my focus to one thing: Happiness With A Capital H.

When I started this blog, I was being treated for depression. I started it for two reasons. One was to keep in touch and share photos of my children to our far away family and friends. The other was to help me focus on the good in my life. To try and help me realize I had a reason to live, and exactly what those reasons were. It worked. I started seeing things I hadn’t noticed before. I started writing about things I hadn’t noticed before. I started photographing things I hadn’t noticed before. And many of you reading this now were here, reading then.

It has been five and a half years since I started writing and focusing on all the good in my life. I am no longer being treated for depression. I have fought hard and won that battle. To those of you still in it, my heart goes out to you with deep empathy. My specific depression had a lot to do with the choices I made early in my adult life, and why I made them, and on the slow steady drain of mothering four small children all at once. Three years ago I decided I was done with medication and the side effects. After six plus years on and off anti-depressants, I wanted to see what my new baseline was. I slowly, sickly, painfully weaned off with the help of a chiropractor. She helped my body come off the drugs and she continues to help me stay healthy and balanced. That was enough for awhile, but soon the depression and hopelessness began creeping back in. So, I began going to therapy. And my life changed. She helped me realize the why of my depression. And how to move forward with all of the pain and knowledge that comes along with that.

She also helped me to realize that I am doing myself a disservice by only focusing on the good.

I want and need to focus on the truth of my life.

Meaning, I don’t have to change what I am doing – I just need to round it out with a good dose of reality. I need to be able to look and ponder over the good and the bad. The happy and the sad.

I do not want this blog to be a place where people come and then leave, feeling depressed over my ‘fantastic life’. Possibly thinking that I have no suffering. That I make no mistakes. That I have no bad days. That I don’t fail. That I’m not a jerk sometimes. That I look cute every day. That my family is perfect. I only recently came to realize that this could be the case. And if this sounds familiar to you, let me just say to you: I AM SORRY. I am sorry I haven’t realized that it is equally beneficial to show you both sides of my life.

All of my focusing on the good, the happy, the sunshine moments – what I did to make myself feel better – was actually a fantasy I was clinging to, and I was leading other people to believe was my only reality. The fact is, I do focus on those moments. They are truthful. I have never made anything up. I do tend to “look on the bright side”, “see the silver lining in every cloud”, and “drink from my half full cup”. But when that is all you, my reader, gets to see – you never get the full picture. And when that is all I, the person living it, choose to see, I can’t see my whole life the way it actually is. I can’t make changes or see problems. I can’t help someone like Mckenna. The day after I posted a truth like the one I am currently struggling with in regards to Mckenna, I could see that. You got a bigger picture of my life. *I* got a bigger picture of my life. A more truthful picture. We all have our unique struggles. We aren’t alone. And that was a big exhale.

I have felt a shift occurring within me for some time, of me not wanting to sit on the fence of who I am any longer. I have made a lot of changes since I started this blog. And yet, I have kept what I write here pretty static. Pretty generic. Pretty focused on the good. The Happy With A Capital H. Today I hope to give you a much more full picture of who I actually am, right now.

So – here is where I slap down some truth. I think I do have a pretty fantastic life. The life Jeff and I have made has a lot of good. And I write enough about that, that I don’t need to get specific about it now. But I also have a lot of suffering, I have a lot of bad days, I constantly make mistakes, I am totally a jerk to people sometimes, and a lot of days I don’t even shower or brush my teeth. I forget things often. I have a double chin and large pores. I get really sweaty when I am shooting. (One of the only things that actually does embarrass me about myself.) I am sixty pounds overweight. Mckenna has visually disturbing scars on 20% of her body, caused by catching on fire in 2005, and caring for them, and her, takes a lot of work. Some days I wish my kids would disappear so that my house would stay clean and I could have a break. My house is almost always messy. I don’t really have many local friends. I feel lonely a lot. But I am learning to like that loneliness, and learning what to fill it up with that is good for me. I wish I had paid more attention in all of my History classes, Geography, and Economics, because I am a dolt when it comes to those subjects. I make up for it now by being extremely curious and learning as much as I can about the past, and the history we are making today. I voted for Obama, although I don’t think he is the cure for all of our problems. In person, I curse like a sailor and have quite the naughty sense of humor. I just don’t necessarily feel that the internet is the place for me to express that. I cringe inside when I hear the name George W. Bush. I support gay marriage, and feel that the LGBT person is equal to me in every way. I am not religious. After having been kind of “half-religious” most of my life, (Episcopalian, then Christian, then Mormon), my belief system is best understood by reading this, from the American Humanist Association.

If any of those things surprise you, or make you no longer want to read my blog, I understand. And not in a glasses versus contacts way. I really and truly understand because it means you have the full picture of who I am, and you are free to make a choice. I respect your choice. I would hope that this wouldn’t change how you feel about me. But I understand if it does.

And something I didn’t go into on that last post. I didn’t get specific enough about what I was dealing with. My daughter Mckenna has an undiagnosed neurological disorder that causes her to have major agitation over simple household noise, major issues transitioning from one thing to another, (even something as simple as getting out of the car), and obsessive compulsive tendencies. She is unpredictable in when she will melt down, but melt down she does. And often. In a meltdown she screams, she will try to take off her clothes, she will lay down on the ground. Often in public, right where people have to walk around her. She will stop everything she is doing, like a stubborn horse you can’t get to move an inch. You pull and yank on the reigns and plead and beg and they just dig in their heels. So does she. She will yell curse words. This started in middle school – she doesn’t know when not to curse like the rest of the kids. (Around teachers and parents.) She has zero social or safety awareness. She has no idea people like their space, and will walk up to someone and touch them inappropriately as she says ‘hello’, or ‘hi, dude!’ She has no idea that she could get hit by a car in a parking lot. In 2006 she left our house unannounced twice, and took off on foot. One time before 6am, when everyone else was asleep, the other time when the kids were playing outside and I was upstairs folding laundry and didn’t realize she had left. Both times we were frantic to find her, and were lucky we did. After her second attempt, we purchased a $300 personal GPS system that she had to wear for months. If she got more than 10 feet away from the base, her bracelet would ring an alarm. A lot of the time, her safety is out of my control, and I live in fear of what may happen to her next. She is intellectually disabled with some autistic like symptoms. We don’t know why and we probably never will. It isn’t for a lack of trying. She is fourteen years old and we have taken her to the doctor to try and figure her out countless times.

One of my friends emailed me something that I thought was so poignant, and I want to share what she said here:

“I think what I love most about this post is that it rips away the curtain.  This fancy curtain that is put up for everyone to see how perfect and beautiful it is on the outside, but if you push back the curtain you get to see what’s real, what’s raw.  You get to see the truth.  And guess what…the truth isn’t all that and a bag of chips sometimes.  And I think it is in these moments of complete honesty that humans can truly relate to one another.  Perfection is an illusion….And the sooner we as parents push back the curtain, the better off we’ll all be.  Because there is comfort in knowing that we are not alone in this situation, that people can relate in some fashion.”

I am so ready to rip away the curtain, and in doing so my hope is that I find even more people that I can relate to, as well as that can relate to me.

Just be.

xo

Tara

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522 Comments

  1. Tara, I have been reading your blog for years and one of the things I love most about what you share is I really felt like while what you post is mostly positive, there is no hiding the truth. You all love each other DEEPLY. Life is not easy but you are living proof that it is better with STRONG family ties. You are the embodiment of MOTHER to me and it is so obvious that your family is your world and it is because of you that they are lifted up. The veil was never there for me, and I’m not sure why…I always find your sharing raw and real…why you think you might have not been is surprising to me. I think the best part of that last post was the stream of consciousness thoughts that you shared…the fear you shared…we all have it, it is so hard to express. I honor you and thank you for sharing a bit more deeply on that day…namaste.

  2. Tara,
    I’ve commented to a couple of posts in the past and told you how amazing you are. I believe I may have even said you are my idol. These past couple of posts have made me realize how truly amazing of a woman you really are. It takes so much courage to be honest. Being honest is such a scary place for me. I’m so afraid of what other people might think of me when they find out my life isn’t perfect. Even now, trying to comment about my feelings about my kids, I’ve deleted the comment 3 times…I’ll keep working on being honest.

    Thank you for being honest in such a public way though. You’ve shown me that it is ok to just be me…and I’m guessing that by being honest about how unperfect my life is, others might be able to relate on a new level.

  3. Oh Tara! You may think that you were hiding the real you from all of us, but it has always been there in the background of all your “Happiness”. AND WE HAVE ALWAYS LOVED YOU FOR BEING YOU. Who you are is captured every time you take a photo. There is so much love and joy in you and guess what? We ALL have baggage. We all have stuff we want to hide from people, we all have things we don’t want to share and challenges that sometimes seem too hard to face, i was reading through all that thinking “I wish you were MY friend” Like you, I have few local friends and I wonder if so many of us hide who and what we are to those around us. If it is easier to be who we want to be with those we don’t see on a regular basis?….hmmm. On the subject of truth: I don’t blog about all the negativity in my life. When I’ve had days where I’ve had kids fighting all day and I’ve been super premenstral and yelled and screamed. The times I’ve felt alone and lost and so fed up with everything- and believe me they happen. Those are the days I find one nice thing from my day to blog about or not at all. Please don’t think you are the only one. We all want to remember the good in our lives. And sharing those negative moments, those times when we don’t have the strength to be the person we wish to to be, should be something we do with those we know we can trust to love us anyway. But that’s what I just love about you Tara, is that you do seem to trust us so completely. We, who you have never met. You do wear those glasses proudly! That takes a tremendous amount of courage. You rock, my dear!

  4. While I’ve long read your blog, I’ve never had the guts to comment. Why? Because you’re just “too cool.” I’ve had you up on this pedestal (which I know is never a fair thing to do to anyone)…but you’re this incredible artist and wife and mom and friend to others, and well, you seem to do it all with this amazing flair and grace that I could never muster.
    But you know what I don’t get? In my eyes (and obviously the eyes of many others), you’ve become even “more cool” with these “life is not all peaches and cream” posts. And yet, I’m no longer afraid to talk to you. I’m no longer afraid to say, “Thank you, Tara, for all the inspiration, for all the laughs, for all the beauty you add to my life just through sharing yours.”

  5. Well, you appear to be pretty “commented out” but I wanted to say, thanks for sharing, specifically about McKenna. Despite the supports that are supposedly available to families with special kids, it doesn’t ever seem enough. And it rarely addresses the parental heart-rending questions and emotional meltdown moments of I-have-no-clue-what-to-do-anymore–but-I-have-to-do-something-because-I’m-the-Mommy-would-someone-just-please-make-him/her-better-and-make-it-all-stop. Maybe these parents feel like quitting because they feel alone, because no one else they know is voicing this same desperation. And I know we want to focus on the positive, and cheer our children on for their victories instead of recording their every failure or frustration. But on the other hand, realistic, vulnerable honesty, shared with fellow sufferers, is one of the unifying truths that carries people through, finding a way on when it seems impossible. POWs in isolation survive much more rarely than those imprisoned in rooms with fellow soldiers. Also, I thought you would enjoy this blog post by another excellent photographer who has a son with SMS, which causes many of the same problems that McKenna has. I read your post and his just a day apart, and was struck by how many of the same things you voiced about your child. http://pacingthepanicroom.blogspot.com/2010/08/dear-ellen.html

    Blessings to you and your family.

  6. thanks for writing this tara. you truly are beautiful. and the beautiful anecdotes you’ve shared with us about your family and your life and are awesome and real and dear, but it was really, really cool to read about just you and where you are and who you are right at this specific time in your life. you’ve reached so many people by being as real as you are – a sincere inspiration for me personally. thanks for being so open and honest… and so positively stunning. :)

  7. Probably a little late commenting on this but here goes anyway.

    I know enough about you — mostly through your brother — and enough about life, to know that the happy times aren’t the only times. And times of transition can be especially challenging, especially for those of us who are prone to depression. You have a son entering adolescence, your baby is in school full time, and McKenna staying much the same. Most of us get to watch our kids grow up, and our nostalgia for their childhood is mixed with pride in their accomplishments and the pleasure of being free to explore the parts of life that we didn’t have time for when raising our family. With McKenna, that process isn’t going to work the way it usually does, and that must be very difficult.

    We don’t raise families to keep them together, though, we raise children to set them on their independent path to adulthood, and even McKenna will need to not be a child forever, even though her transition to adulthood will look different. There will be options, and there is help so that you can enjoy the next phase of your life as much as you have enjoyed this one.

    I’ve known and worked with a lot of people with a variety of disabilities. and the parents who see their adult children, in spite of their limitations, as having potential and character and accomplishments in their own right are doing those children a great service. You are becoming the parent of a young woman and clinging to the role you have had with her is not only overwhelming for you, it will not be the best thing for her either. So don’t feel badly about needing help, or finding ways for her to be away from you sometimes It’s not wrong, it’s essential for all of you.

  8. Thank you for writing this, and for bravo for having the strength and will to rip away the curtain and let yourself shine through, all of you.

    I don’t comment often, but i have read your blog religiously for years. and let me just say, your “slap down some truth” paragraph, while about you, I swear i could have written the EXACT same thing about myself.

    You Rock! Just be you! and keep letting all your awesomeness shine through!

  9. Oh Tara, none of what you revealed in this very personal post sounds shocking to me! I have four kids too, and one of my daily goals is to brush my teeth and dress myself beyond just throwing on the clothes I wore yesterday. So I was delighted by your honesty. (If you could see the state of the apartment I’m sitting in…it looks like it was ransacked.) My third child (age 7) most likely has an undiagnosed genetic syndrome and constantly walks up to people and touches their faces as he attempts to connect with them. I understand you’re writing about an important shift in your life. But your posts have never seemed like you were sugar-coating anything. I’m not sure you owe your readers anything beyond what YOU happen to want to express. And you always express things that feel special–poetic, real life, authentic moments that you capture so beautifully, both in photos and in words. This path you’re on now feels special and significant also. Thank you for sharing this with your readers.

  10. Tara…

    I don’t even know what to say, so it’s completely silly that I am commenting right now (1:30 am), but I needed to read both of these posts at this very moment. Both of my children struggle with Sensory Processing/ Sensory Integrative Disorders. One is very much like McKenna. He is terrified by wind, noise, texture, crowds, low lighting etc. and he is off to Kindergarten tomorrow. The youngest (3) has proprioceptive issues. She needs more physical input than most to maintain self control. She is off to part time preschool next week. With the help of occupational therapy, my children are learning to adjust to the world around us, but it is often difficult for others to understand. I am just coming out of my early motherhood shell after trying to learn how to navigate life with these two beautiful, persnickety, life changing children, and must launch my blog next week to try and put myself back out there. Your words of unabashed truth have given me the kick in the pants to just jump!

    This is a link that I used in my attempts to foster more understanding with family members.

    http://www.livestrong.com/article/19084-treatments-sensory-integration-disorder/

    Thanks for being so candid! Yours is a great talent!

    Chezley Royster
    Mom, Photographer, Child Advocate

  11. I just wanted to thank you (in my very bad english*g*) for ripping away the curtain – and you are not alone – my son Gabriel has Down Syndrome – and when I write about being a mother to him,I think I also do “with a curtain” – I guess, I will change that…
    Thank you – I love your blog since about 2 years, I love your photos and they are inspiring to me – but now, not only your photos are an inspiration, you are the inspiring one:-)
    *hugs* from far away (Vienna)
    Nora

  12. Thank you so much for sharing this! I have been thinking about the whole “ripping away the curtain” for a while now.It makes me more brave to do it. And I have in the last couple years, tried to figure out how I can see myself better and what I need to change. I think this is a great way to see myself better! :)

  13. Hi Tara. After reading this post I look even MORE forward to visiting your blog. I say..BRING ON the behind the scenes of Tara. Like you, I want to ‘dig in’ to a person..forget the small talk..what makes you tink? what do you beleive in? WHO ARE YOU?!! I love all the raw and emotional posts. peace and blessings to you Tara!!

  14. Tara,
    I don’t know you, except through your blog. I have always admired your writing and your photography I have a sense of who you are, I’m thinking back to your blog about your causes – clean drinking water and fewer plastics – and I have thought “I’d like to meet her some day.” Your recent blogs, the unveiling if you will, hasn’t changed that. Don’t we all struggle? Don’t we all have things about which we’re not proud? Thanks for your honesty.

    Still reading in Phoenix,
    Becky

  15. Tara, I have been watching you parent McKenna for what feels like more than 10 years. I remember the first layout of yours that drew me to you…It was called QUIRKS about McKenna….do you remember the one? Your honesty and raw humanity then as a new mom with a daughter who was different captured my heart and soul. And so for all these years I search out your work, not only because I love your style and talent but more importantly because I love your heart and how your humanity is right there. It is stunningly beautiful!

    Thank you,

    Stephanie (with a special little boy) in Minnesota

  16. Tara,
    I read your blog every once in a while. I have never posted, but I felt the need to now. As I sit here in tears reading all the beauty you have written, I just knew I had to comment. Thank you for your honesty, and for letting others know that it’s ok not to be perfect and for everything to be 100% happy all the time. In regards to Mckenna, I know your not very religious, neither am I, but I do believe that everything happens for a reason and that we aren’t handed more than we can handle. That doesn’t mean it’s easy, but you are a strong person, and a wonderful mother.

  17. Dear Tara,

    I noticed all the comments to your post. I have no clue if you will ever get to mine, so I will write it for me as much as I will write it for you.

    I feel you. I really do. Although some of your issues, I do not have, many I do share. Over the last two years my so-called perfect world…or what the outside saw as my perfect world…beautiful family, beautiful home, married to a physician, wealthy…was blasted open by my husband’s mental illness. Although I never saw it at the time. I wanted so desperately to believe in this perfect world that I had created. Many difficult life changes happened over the last two years leading to my husband committing suicide in our home two months ago. In our home. My six year old daughter heard the screaming when I discovered him and came running down…she saw him. We are all (as in myself and my 4 children) in therapy. Many days I feel so lonely I ache. Because like you I have very few close friends. I curse like a sailor… I have a ton of children, one of them also with bipolar disorder like his father, I parent different than many…. the list goes on …

    On the outside people look at me and wonder how I can go on. They see me as some sort of hero for getting out of bed every day. For attempting to keep our lives as normal as possible. But in reality, I do it because I have to … because if I don’t, who will?

    Needless to say, I read your post and wanted to share some love from afar … me in South Dakota, and you in my home state of California (I grew up in Ontario).

    Much love,

    Anya Wait

  18. Oh Tara, I have been following your blog for years. Loved you eversince my early scrapbooking days. Like that you keep it real. Some people in scrap or blog land seem so uptight “We don’t drink alcohol so we toasted to apple cider for our anniversary” “I love to clean my bathroom with a toothbrush” yeah me too- I did that before with a boyrfiends toothbrush years ago. That’s fine it’s their life and as long as everybody is happy. I love Jesus and also love a mean Margarita. Anyway totally dig that you don’t care that your house is a mess(which I’m sure it isn’t. or whatever. I love the journey of your little family. If I lived near you I would so drag your butt over fire up the margarita machine and swim. Lisa in DE

  19. Thank you for this – it means a lot to me. I’ve been reading your blog for years, it’s so beautiful, but I will be honest and admit I was one of those people who would compare my life to what I read about yours. So thanks, and my thoughts, prayers, and warmest wishes for you and your family.

  20. So I’m pretty much in love with you now ;) My girl crush is officially cemented. Depression sucks – I tell my nasty inner voice to F off. No one could possibly be as mean to me as my inner monologe so I’ve learned to tell it to shut up! It works about 60% of the time ~grin. If you ever need photos done or a delicious cocktail in portland I’m your girl~ Stay strong mama!

  21. hi Tara,
    thank you for your honesty & just being you. As an ex-special ed teacher, I respect the highs & lows that kids can bring and celebrate the way parents like you need to learn to roll with the punches.
    As a wife of a husband who is quardriplegic due to a drunk driver, I get there are so many aspects of our personal lives that people on “the outside” will never understand…how there are days when getting dressed is the ultimate victory.
    As a woman who may look “less than perfect” by society’s standards with glasses (um, frequently too lazy for contats) and a good layer of chub, I get seeing myself through other people’s eyes.

    thanks for your honesty….it’s always a good reminder to know that the way we perceive people and their lives is unfair & usually grossly incorrect
    hugs,
    Kelley from Maine

  22. Tara, I love this post. I skipped over it initially…running around crazy and out of time…but I am SO glad I came back to read it. This whole post comforted me…made me feel, better. I love your honesty. It inspires me. Thank you for sharing. I mean it…thank you so much.

  23. It takes balls to put it all out there… an you’ve got big balls. You are so amazing and courageous. I can relate to everything you have said. Letting others see what we think are our imperfections is one of the hardest things ever … I am wondering how it feels now that you did it?

  24. I kid you not, as I am reading this the song “I’ll stand by you” came up in the shuffle.

    I am one of those that has been here a very, very long time. We have never met, but I have followed the story of your family and sent you happy thoughts from nor cal.

    Let me just say thank you, from the bottom of my heart. I completely admire the honesty you have shown not just in these 2 posts but in so many that may not have seemed like a big deal to you. You may be surprised at how those “Just Be You” moments shared here have impacted your readers. It is why we come back.

    Just Be You, babe. Whatever that means, whatever your story.

    Maybe someday we will meet in person for coffee or margaritas and I can tell you the many ways you have impacted my life. You changed my whole “family photo” perspective and inadvertantly introduced me to a photographer that captured my family. You inspired me with the month project thing, reminded me of my wonderful sister (who also has 4 kiddos) and I even tried to grow out my hair like yours. (lame I know)

    Just so you can smile.

    Anyway — what I am trying to say (with no succintness whatsoever) is that if you find blogging to be therapy, embrace that. We all need a little peace in our lives. Let your thoughts out there in the world and see where they land.

    “Nothing you confess … can make me love you less…

    So if your mad, get mad…

    When your standing at the crossroads…

    Cause even if your wrong…

    I’ll stand by YOU!”

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHA………. Ok … hope that helped you smile a little today.

  25. absolutely fabulous. you sound like you could be my sister. i know that what you go through with on a daily basis with McKenna must almost feel impossible. i’m sure you can’t always be patient with her and that you probably suffer with your thoughts on that but rest assured we all have days that we wish we had a fairy godmother and no one would judge you for that. not surprising is that we have the same political and religious views. i spot my peeps from a great distance and i could see that in you before you spoke it.

    i did a couple post like this on my blog because i sometimes get the feeling people can’t at all see me for real. here is one about parenting http://lifeamundo.blogspot.com/2010/03/perfect-parent.html, one about not showing real life on blogs http://lifeamundo.blogspot.com/2010/03/breathe-in-and-let-go.html and some crazy facts about me that people might not know http://lifeamundo.blogspot.com/2010/07/good-bad-the-ugly.html see. you are not alone.

  26. At no point when I read blogs do I ever assume a person’s life is bliss and sunshine all the time, it’s incredibly short sighted.

    Thank you for being so honest. I’m sure it was difficult but it makes me love you even more (and not in a weird way… more like in a “oh sister, I know exactly what you’re talking about and empathize with your daily dose of chaos” way)

  27. I found your blog thru Flickr. I fell in love with your work from day one. Admired and adored it! You rock in so many ways. Most photog blogs, mine included… usually act as space for clients to see work, so hence a curtain is pulled most times. I just read this post and have to say you have touched me very much. I struggle most times trying to keep it all together, waking up to hit the computer before even brushing my teeth or showering! I thought I was alone….. It makes me feel good knowing I am not. I am sorry for the roller coasters life has thrown your way, BUT…. that energy….. that immense emotion and passion you sound to have, it comes thru in your work VIVIDLY! If there ever was one woman that I would feel comfortable being photographed by…. it would be you :)

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